


When Statues Crumble

by LoyalTheorist



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Bill Cipher Redemption, Bill is such a dork, Ford really does hate him, Human Bill Cipher, Mabill if you squint, Stan only really shows up like once, Tags Contain Spoilers, so does dipper
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-08-17
Packaged: 2019-05-25 19:34:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 12,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14984084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LoyalTheorist/pseuds/LoyalTheorist
Summary: Sometimes, being incompetent has its advantages. Specifically that people will occasionally come check on you to make sure that you haven't actually killed yourself.(Or: Bill is the biggest dork)





	1. The Awakening

Juniper's green hair fell in her face as she ran. She didn't brush it away, though. That would mean breaking her hand formation, and she was almost to the end. Soon, she would let her brother out. Soon, he would be free. She would have doused herself in water quite a while ago, if she had the ability. Only a few more hours before she could free her brother from his stone prison. Only a few more hours of endless running before twelve months were up, and her brother was free. For a second, Juniper marveled at the fact that she had been able to keep herself going for this long, but then reminded herself that, as a dream demon, she was immortal, and therefore of was highly unlikely she would tire of this anytime soon. True, her brother was on the list of most wanted criminals in the mutiverse, but she was sure that was just peer pressure.

How? A part of herself thought. How can you think that?! He literally took over our home dimension until he grew bored, at which point he destroyed it. Not to mention he's a very strong willed dream demon. It wasn't peer pressure.

She would regret doing this, probably. Her brother would brush it off as something she had done because of blood, not because she actually liked him. And then there was the price to pay for the magic. There was no possible way to get around that...though actually there might have been. Her brother had always been good at finding amazing loopholes. The price being the two became human. She had searched for quite a while for something to deter the effects. The farthest she had gotten was allowing them to keep their abilities for elemental manipulation and production. Only a few more moments. She wondered how old the two of them would be. He was older than she was. However, She, Juniper Cipher, was more mature than her brother, Bill Cipher .

-LINE, TAKE A BREAK.

"Why did we have to wait the extra two weeks to come here? I can't wait two hours!" Mabel Pines' long, chocolate brown hair fell in her face, but it was quickly brushed aside.

"Because Grunkle Stan and Great Uncle Ford didn't get back from their trip until now." Her twin brother, Dipper, said matter-of-factly, readjusting his new glasses. They made his already intelligent appearance look even smarter, but they remained awkward and large on him, constantly needing to be pushed back up.

"Oh, right. I am soooo suuuppperrr exxiiiittteeed Diiiippper!" The post-preteen bounced up and down in her seat. Then she paused. "Oh, my gosh! What if...the Gnomes still want me to be their queen?"

Dipper shrugged. "Unless they've found a new Queen, they probably will. But I don't think there's anything to worry about. We've beaten them before, and we could beat them again!" The male twin seemed more confident in his abilities than usual, and he felt more confident. This could likely be attributed to the fact that the two Pines Twins were returning to one of the most exiting places in the multiverse. Gravity Falls. One of the strangest places on Earth. Others would ignore the oddities until they couldn't anymore. Like last summer, when Bill Cipher, a psychopathic and powerful dream demon, created a rift in time and space so the Nightmare Dimension could leak into theirs. The guy was a serious creepster.

"We're lucky we even get to come back at all, especially with the number of fork scars I received last summer." Dipper stated.

"Oh, right. Dipper, I'm really sorry I didn't notice, I-,"

"No, it's fine. You had your play to worry about. I'm just glad you realized in the end and didn't give Bill the journal." The younger twin hugged his sister. He had decided a while back she didn't deserve anger from him anymore. She had had enough right after the demonic possession incident.

The bus pulled into Gravity Falls.

"Oh. My. Gosh. We're here! Dipper we're here! I cannot wait to see everyone! Dipper, why aren't you smiling so much your mouth hurts? I'm smiling so much my mouth hurts!"

-LINE! WHAT DID I JUST SAY?

Bill Cipher opened his glistening blue eyes slowly. He felt different. It was worrying him. As he began to observe the world around him, he turned, and came face to face with a brown haired girl, almost exactly his height.

"Juniper." He said.

"You're a human now. Acknowledge that in some way. Please. I'm begging you." Said the girl, and Bill watched her, in what could almost only be called fixation, marvelling at how you could make a 17,452,764 year old look like they were fourteen. It just didn't make sense. But it was amusing.

"I would, but I'm really not feeling like it right now." The boy stated.

"Could you be any more obnoxious!?"

"Yeah, do you want to see?"

"No! No. Never mind. What are we going to do?"

"Lie on the ground and almost die. And then go beg for mercy from somebody. And then kill them in their sleep. That sounds fun."

"Bill! No! I swear, you can soooo annoying sometimes!"

"Thennnnnnnn what are we going to do, sis?"

"I don't know! That's why I asked you! And don't call me sis."

"You aren't the boss of me."

"Oh, but I am. Given the fact that in the dying flames that englobed our dimension, Mom and Dad-you remember Mom and Dad, right? They asked me to take of you and that, if you asked, yes, I was the boss of you."

"I don't need taken care of! I'm fine."

"Says the guy who was just stuck inside a statue."

"I-shut up! I'm fine. You're fine. We can go our separate ways." The boy turned and balled himself up on the ground.

"Bill, get up you're fine, and-," Then Juniper realized that the boy might not be fine. "Bill, are you okay?"

He started to cry.

"They beat me. I was so close. So close...and I couldn't do it. I failed and I failed miserably."

"Bill, I, I, who's them?"

"Stanford Pines. Stanley Pines. The entire freaking Pines family."

"Well then, um, let's go get back at them so you regain your self confidence!"

"Yay! Revenge!" Bill stood and wiped the tears from his eyes. "Can I kill then?"

"Let's not kill them, okay? That sounds like a bad idea.

"Can I torture them?"

"As long as your torture is psychological. Then you can."

"Yay! Psychological torture! That sounds fun!"

"I'm concerned."


	2. Bill & Juniper

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And so the chronicles of Jh-Juniper and Bill continue.

"And it was super fun!" Mabel finished her overly long talk quickly, bouncing up and down. "Except for algebra. I was really, really bad at algebra."

"I was great at algebra!" Dipper interjected.

"Right. You keep reminding me of that. Now stop it, we all know you're super smart." Mabel said, annoyed.

There was a knock on the door.

"I'll get it." said Ford, speaking for the first time since the initial hellos. He stood and walked over to the door. Upon opening it, he found a two teenagers. One was fairly tall, with light brown hair and bright blue eyes. The other was of an average hight, but so skinny you'd think he'd not eaten in weeks, blonde hair standing bright against his pale skin.

"If you're here for the Mystery Shack part of the house, it's on the side."  
Silence. Stanford took a step back.

"Who are you?" He asked, suspicious.

More silence. A feeling of dread set in.

"Who are you? Asked Ford again, taking a step back.

"Caroline. I'm Caroline Bakersfield and this is my brother, Calypso." Spoke the blue-haired one, toying with her wavy locks.

"Do you have proof of that?" The world's nerdiest old man questioned.

"No, sir. Please, we got lost during our family camping trip, we don't even know where we are, and we just want something to eat." The blonde spoke now, his green eyes glistening.

There were so, so, many holes in that statement, and Stanford Pines, being a suspicious, untrusting man, saw them all.

"I won't let you in unless you can provide valid proof that you are who you say you are."

"Fine, alright." The two turned and left.

Ford watched them leave, staring at them until they were out of sight. He could be wrong, but he thought there was something very familiar about the boy.

-SERIOUSLY LINE, THIS IS GETTING RIDICULOUS. "Well, that didn't work." Bill said. He was lying on the ground again, but this time in an omnipessimistic, bored way.

"Okay, listen Bill. We have to get close to the kids. " Juniper paced in circles.

"Or we could just go up to them and tell them who we are. That'd be fun." Bill said.

"True, but we'd lose the opportunity to get close to them and become 'friends' so we can tell them who we are after, like, a month."

Haha! That's awesome. It'd really mess with their psyche." Bill was laughing now, his golden brown hair falling in his face. THen he fell backwards and hit a tree. "OWWWWWWWWWW."

Juniper laughed.  
"That's what you get for being psychopathic.'

"OH, SHUT UP, YOU."

" _Someone's_ moody today, aren't they?"  
"I hate you."

"The feeling is mutual."

"Would you be quiet for one second?"  
"Alright, alright. Are you okay?"  
"That's not being quiet."  
"Shut up!"

"Pssh, no, I-,"  
"NO, SERIOUSLY. SHUT UP."

The two quieted down.

"Over here! I think I heard something!" Dipper's prepubescent voice resounded through the trees.

"Okay, okay, I'm coming bro-bro." Mabel's voice quickly responded with what what was almost ultimate nervous excitement.

The twins crashed through the bushes.

The siblings held their breath.

"Who are you?" Mabel asked.

"We're two people who just so happen to be in the woods hoping you don't find us." Juniper offered, smiling like a deranged child and giggling nervously.

"Juniper, you're being creepy." Stated Bill, peering at the girl avidly.

"Oh, shut up you. I'm Juniper, and this is my brother...Severus Snape."

"What? Shut up."

"After all this time?"

"Always."

The short silence that remained after the bittersweet line was broken by a comment from Dipper.

"So, what's your name?"

Bill looked down at the boy.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you. And that'd be no fun."

"What's your name?" Mabel pressed.

Juniper wished she had her mind reading powers, just so that she could tell what Bill was thinking in this moment of extreme stupidity.

"Bill Cipher."

They ran.

"What'd you do that for, you idiot?" Asked Juniper.

"Relax. We'll be fine. As long as we aren't here when they show back up with Stanford. And they will show back up with Stanford." Bill said nonchalantly.

"Your emotions! They change so quickly!" Juniper shouted up at the boy, who was now lying lazily in a nearby tree.

"Well, yeah. Had you not noticed this before?"

"You know what you said about going? Yeah, let's do that."

"Pshhh. We have a good fifteen minutes left. Right now I feel like lying in this tree."

"Oh my lanta! Bill Cipher! You are going to climb out of that tree, and we are going to walk somewhere else!"

"Oh my lanta? Really? And You were mocking me for saying Holy Pines Twins, Batman! That's hilarious! And you're a hypocrite!"

"Have I ever told you how much I hate you?"

"Probably! But there's always room to hate me more, isn't there!?"

"You're an idiot. There. Now that that's been cleared up, let's go...Bill, what are you doing?"

The boyhad climbed further up the tree. Juniper sighed.

"Don't be an idiot, Cipher. Get down."

Bill did not stop climbing.

"You're a Cipher too, you know. Also, I like this tree. It's a nice tree."

"Shut up, and get the heck down from there. We need to go."

Bill had begun to walk to the end of one of the tree's many branches, holding out his thin arms for balance.

"Bill Mason Cipher. You are going to climb down out of that tree this instant, and we are going to leave."

He did a backflip; Landing on his feet and preemptively stalling their leaving. Then he turned and walked away, his bright yellow hair looking slightly less neat then it had been beforehand. Hesitantly, Juniper followed.

"How did you even do that?" She asked.

"I'm not stupid. I know how to jump out of a tree."


	3. Mabel is Awesome

Juniper sighed. They'd been walking for hours, and she was almost sure they were lost.

"Bill."

"We aren't lost. I promise."

"What are your promises supposed to mean to me?"

"What do you mean?"

"I know you, Bill. Your promises are worth nothing to me or to anyone, and I doubt that will change."

"Okay, fine. We're lost. That can mean one of two things. 1. This town is considerably larger than I thought. Or, 2. We're walking in circles."

The two sat down.

"Well, we seem pretty safe. Nobody has found us yet, have they?" Bill offered.

Juniper didn't respond. She no longer felt like listening to her brother's mindless banter. She stared off into space, organizing her thoughts.

_Bill is annoying. We're going to need food. I am so stinking hungry right now. Why did I do this for him? I mean, sure, he's my brother, but other than that. Nothing? Alright. I suppose that's a good enough reason._

"For some reason, I don't think you'd notice if I wandered off right now." Bill said. There was no response. "C'mon! Sis! Notice me! Juniper? Juniper. Earth to Juniper. No? Okay. Bye!" He got up and started to walk away.

"Bill, come back."

"Really?"

"Yes, really. I need you to look at this."

Bill turned and came back.

"I hate you."

They had been walking in circles. They must have been, because they were now both hidden in the thick shrubbery around the edge of the woods that just so happened to be the closest to The Mystery Shack.

"Aw, come on!" Bill said loudly before Juniper shushed him.

"Yeah...this will likely not end well if we go back into the woods. Magic is guiding us back here. And while magic is admirable for never giving up, magic is also annoying because  _it never gives up._ "

The two walked into the fading sunlight.

-GUYS, THE LINE IS A WORKAHOLIC.

As previously mentioned, Stanford Pines was not a people person. He had never been a people person, and very likely never would be a people person. It simply wasn't how Stanford worked. Many would have speculated that this was due to Stanford's oddities, both physical and mental, and in many ways they would be right. Having six fingers on each hand had certainly never helped his sociability.

Bill Cipher, on the other hand, was a people person. And that wasn't to say he liked people (He didn't) he simply liked interacting with people, because he thought they were stupid, and, far more importantly, amusing, because they thought that their universe was the only one. Some of them had caught onto the idea that there must be more universes out there, but then they would always assume that they were all pretty much like the one they lived in now. It was hilarious. Bill, too had oddities, but he would never have hidden them. Not in one million years. Because many people would have described him as an overly confident, sarcastic, and sadistic jerk.

Then there was Mabel Pines. She was different, and strange, and if someone managed to knock her down hard enough for it, it could take a while for her to get back up. She was also, however, confident, and friendly. She was smart, for a girl of her age, though certainly not as smart as her five-minutes-younger twin brother Dipper, who was smart for a fifteen-year-old, despite only being thirteen. Mabel was something of a mix between Stanford and Bill, with one of the biggest differences from Bill being that Mabel Pines, unquestionably, undoubtedly and undeniably, was of a good alignment.

Which is why when she opened the door in that particular Fourth of July, she did not hesitate to kick Bill Cipher in the shins.

-I'M...OUT OF LINE JOKES.

Bill fell over. On top of Juniper.

And then he rolled off of Juniper, because it is very hard to stay on top of someone when you have just been kicked in the shins by another someone, especially when the first someone is actively trying to push you off of them.

Juniper sat down tailor fashion next to Bill.

"Are you okay?"

"NOPE. I'm very dead. Shooting Star killed me." Bill raised one of his hands, and, despite the fact that he was lying face down on the ground, managed to point in the general direction of the door frame, although, there wasn't a Mabel. Presumably she had gone back inside.

"She's not there."

"Noooo, why did she have to leave, we were having such good times!?"

"Is it just me, or does Such Good Times seem grammatically incorrect?"  
"Now you say that, I'm not actually sure. But it seemed the best thing to say twenty-seven seconds ago."

 _"_ Riiiiight. Stand."  
Bill stood. . .and then fell over again. Juniper sighed.

"You're lucky you're so incredibly light."  
(The two would later find out Bill was 5'6'' and weighed around ninty-seven pounds. But that's later, and I shall not tell you where or when this happens.)

Juniper picked him up and carried him piggyback to the edge of the woods, just in case they needed to flee for their lives later.

The door had swung closed in this amount of time, and it opened suddenly, revealing the pink nose and brown hair of Dipper Pines. He was, as he hadn't grown much over the summer, wearing his hat and dark blue vest, though one could see that it had been sewn together in some places, and patched with another peice of blue fabric on one of the shoulders. He spun around, and appeared to be talking to someone, likely Mabel, because literally anyone else would have been taller then him.

Then there was a scream of 'GRAPPLING HOOK!' And Bill Cipher was knocked unconscious.


	4. Sleep Trouble

Juniper lay in the forest sobbing miserably.

_I abandoned him. I abandoned my brother. Why'd I have to do that? I'm such an idiot! And now here I am. Not going back for him, oh no, I'm laying here in the middle of the forest. Doing nothing! Nothing! I'm alone with my thoughts, crying, and not saving my brother like a real spirit of Order would have done. Axolotl knows what they're doing to him now._

More sobs. The tears continued until a spider ran over her face and she got up.

She rubbed her eyes and set off into the direction of the Mystery Shack. She was a real Spirit of Order, The real Spirit of Order, and she would fight like one if the need arose.

It took about half an hour for Juniper to get back to the small clearing where the Mystery Shack was located. She had run a long way before collapsing, and was tired after doing so, naturally.

She had to push the magical barrier surrounding the Shack slightly before it broke, recognizing the magical traces of what she had been.

Opening the door and walking inside the part of the Mystery Shack that served as a house brought her with some stairs, two doors, one to her left and one to her right, and a hallway, which appeared to lead straight to where she wanted to go, the living room, the hideous dirty yellow chair and television noises being her indicators.

She walked forward into the room, but found it to be void of people. A basket with some balls of yarn had a half-finished baby blue sweater draped on it, indicating that Mabel did knit sweaters as Bill had described to her recently. Her next stop was attic. She turned around, and started in the direction of the stairs-before running straight into Stanford Pines.

-LINE.

J _uniper Cipher had never been so terrified in her life._

_"Who are you? Why are you here?" Ford demanded._

_Juniper took a deep breath. There were a thousand different people she could tell him she was, a thousand different reasons she could give him for being here-but none of them would have worked out. Never. Not at any point. So she chose the truth._

_"I am Juniper Cipher. I am-, "_

_"You are a Cipher?"_

_"Yes. Bill is my brother." She said._

* * *

Juniper, now locked in a cage under the Mystery Shack, replayed the scenario over and over in her head. She was almost-no, completely certain that could've gone better. She didn't have shoes, and the floor underneath her feet was freezing cold, leaving her to be quite a bit uncomfortable until she remembered her retainence of elemental powers and maaged to summon a fair number of lamb's ears leaves.

Stanford watched her for a long time, taking what Juniper could only assume must have felt like dozens upon dozens of notes.

Then he left, and did not come back. Juniper switched from a standingg position to a sitting one. Her legs had gotten tired over the past- well, day.

Juniper thought a second. If a day had passed, it must be night.

What did humans do at night? For this one, Juniper did not have to take a second. They slept. And they had dreams. Juniper was a Dream Keeper, unlike her brother, who liked giving bad dreams-the humans called them nightmares- and as such, had earned himself the title of Dream Demon.

Juniper, being a Dream Keeper, was familiar with the concept of dreams, but not with actually having them. Or sleep. Going to sleep had never been something Juniper had needed to do before, and, as such, had never done.

So she lay on her back in the dark for a very long time before finally drifting off.

-LINE, MY "FRIEND"

Bill sat on Mabel's bed while she watched him.

"...annnnnd that is how you sleep!"

"Well, Shooting Star, I have to congratulate you. Listening to that was...a complete waste of time. You just explained how to do a whole lot of nothing."

"Yep!"

"So sleeping...is just doing nothing?"

"Umm...yes? No? Kind of. Is it? Dipper?"

Dipper had been listening to this boring, pointless conversation for at least a half an hour, and he was ready for it to be over NOW.

"In order to sleep, you lie down, close your eyes, and be  _completely silent._ " He said.

"Nooo! You don't get it!" Screamed Mabel. "What is sleeping? Are you doing nothing?"

Dipper sighed.

"I'll... go get a dictionary."

Dipper walked downstairs, leaving Mabel and Bill in silence.

"Well. Dipper's gone now."

"Yes. Yes he is."

"Can I ask you a question?"

"Only if then I can ask you a question."

"Okay!"

"Okay.

"Why did you try to make Earth all weird?"

"Is Earth not already weird?"

"You know what I mean!"

"Yeah. I dunno. I was bored?"

"I don't think that's it."

"What does a sweater-wearing thirteen-year-old know?"

"Hey! This Sweater-Wearing thirteen-year-old knows lots of things!"  
"And, notably, is also part of a Great Prophecy, I've noticed. That'd get just about anywhere in the multiverse."

"What's a Great Prophecy?"

"I dunno, you tell me, Miss I-Know-Lots-of-Things."

"You know lots of things though. You said so yourself!"  
"You remember that?"  
"It's hard to forget."

"Are you part of a Great Prophecy?"  
"Hard not to be when you're being used as a storage container for the essence of pure Chaos."

"How many?"

"Just four that I know of. You can only do so many heroic deeds in one lifetime."

"So the Great Prophecy says you'll be heroic? "  
"Eh, it's a Prophecy. Kinda hard to tell."

"What's it say?"  
"Hold on, let me think a minute. It's not in English."  
A minute passed. Mabel crossed her legs.

"When the time comes that snow and thunder collide, a confession shall bring forth the rise of hope.  
It shall be on the day that rocks will rain from the sky, the Emperor of Lies shall usher forth a new fury and a time of serenity. The darkness abides in the wrong souls. Fire will put out water. Blood will rain from the heavens."

"That...doesn't sound good."

"Yep."

So...what's the one with me in it?"  
"Welll...I actually don't know what the one with you in it sounds like. But I said "Shooting Star" and Juni was like "OH MY GOSH. YOU WERE DEFEATED BY THE SHOOTING STAR? THE ONE FROM THE GREAT PROPHECY?!" And I was like "Sure, I guess." And then she freaked out. I don't know if that's good or bad, but it was a thing that happened."

"Juni? As in Juniper? Is she the girl who was with you earlier?"  
"Yeah. She's my sister."

"Is she cool?"  
"Yeah, kinda, I guess. Can we not talk about her?"  
"No. SHARE WITH ME THE SECRETS OF THE WORLD AND YOU RELATIONSHIPS WITH YOUR FAMILY MEMBERS!"  
"Shooting Star-,"  
"Or I could go tell Great Uncle Ford you're here...,"

"NO! No, okay...When Juni and I were kids, we were friends. Good friends. We wouldn't go anywhere without each other. Then one day we were offered what seemed to be the greatest honor in the world at the time-we were going to get to be the Spirits of Chaos and Order. We-,"  
"You were the Spirit of Chaos, weren't you?"  
"NO. I'M THE FREAKING SPIRIT OF PURE ORDER."  
"Oh. okay."  
"You'll believe anything, won't you? OF COURSE I'm the Spirit of Chaos. We accepted. We were amazing with our new powers. But everyone loved Juni. I was shoved to the side, ignored...forgotten. Even though I knew she was still technically Juniper Cipher, she didn't feel like my sister anymore."  
"Why'd they need you two?"  
"The other Spirits of Order and Chaos kept killing the other every millennia or so, they needed somebody who wouldn't do that. Two somebodies, actually. I...I just...,"  
He was silent.

Mabel hugged him.

"Why don't we talk about something else? You were telling me about Great Prophecies before. What are the other ones you're in?"

Bill looked relieved to have something to say.

"When the day comes that prey kills predator, four siblings shall cause an end to enemies. The Emperor of lies will wed the Lady of justice. A surrender will signify a time of growth and an era of honor.

A child's sorrow will seal fates with a gift."

"It's the Emperor of Lies again!"  
"Yep."  
Dipper ran in.

"1. Sleep is the natural periodic suspension of consciousness during which the powers of the body are restored, and 2. I think I just found Bill's sister."


	5. Simple

Bill squealed.

"Really?"

"Yeah. She's...not like you." Dipper responded.

"I've noticed. But that's beside the point. She's Juni! Where is she? Is she okay?"

"For a dream demon, you sure care about your sister a lot."

"A her younger brother, it is my job. Surely, you can relate."

Dipper shrugged. He  _could_ relate, but he wasn't about to tell that to Bill.

"She's locked in a cage in the baesment."

"What? We have to break her out!"

"She's a lot nicer than you are."

"I'd noticed. Wait, how would you know? You don't know me on a personal level. I'm very nice!" There was a pause. "When I'm with people I like."

Dipper sighed.

"Right. Most people are nice when they're with other people they like."

Mabel opened the door. "Am I going to be the only one in this secret sister-rescuing mission?"

Bill lept at her.

"No!I'm coming! Blame Pine Tree!"

Mabel giggled.

-HEY, LINE! GET BACK OVER HERE!

Juniper was asleep again. And she would have stayed sleeping if the elevator didn't make such a loud noise when it reaches its destination. But it did. And Juniper was awake again. In the darkness, she could make out her brother's thin figure. He walked up to her.

"Bill! You're Okay!"

"Yeah, mostly. Are you okay?"

"Yeah. Bill, listen, I'm really sorry for running away, I just-,"

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever. You know how you can make it up to me?"

"Wha-how?"

"Shut up."

There was a small 'ahha!' In the darkness, followed by a 'you found it?' and the Pines twins rounded the corner.

Mabel ran up to Juniper's cage and unlocked it.

The alarm bells went off.

Then came the longest two minutes of Mabel Pines' life. Days might as well have gone by in those two minutes.

It was a full week before both her Great-Uncles were out of the house at the same time. A full week before she could sneak down into the basement and see how Bill and Juniper were. Of course, she already partially knew how they were doing-she had heard the screams of a teenage boy, the sobbing pleas that had sounded so much like her brother's.

It was times like these Mabel belived more than anything that  _everyone_ deserved a second chance, no matter how bad what they had done was.

As soon as she reached the Bill and Juniper were on, she gasped. Bill was asleep, completely dead to the world, his own blood in puddles around him. He was scarily thin, and, though Mabel hadn't thought it possible, even paler then when she had first seen him.

She looked away.

Juniper lay in the other corner of the room. Unlike Bill, she had been handled with-well, it couldn't really be called care, but with a strange sort of precision and caution. Her body had taken on something of a burnt, ashen look, and it was horrifying.

She was frozen. She couldn't breathe. So she sat there for a very long time.

-LINE! THIS PART OF THE STORY WAS SAD, AND THE READERS NEED CONFORT!

Stanford Pines walked through the door of his current dwelling anxiously. What if one of them had escaped? What if they had hurt the kids? He ran upstairs and scanned the attic. It was empty. He called for them. Neither twin responded. Then it was to the basement he ran. He had to enter the code twice into the vending machine, because he had entered it incorrectly in his haste.

When he got down and saw Mabel, he screamed for her, and she turned to him. Chocolate brown eyes met ocean blue ones, and the girl uttered one Earth-shattering word.

"Why?"

"Why? Mabel, who knows what they're still capable of?! Who knows what they would have done to you, to the entire world?" Stanford was outraged. "Now where's Dipper?"

"Why couldn't we have tried to give him a second chance?" Mabel asked.

"Mabel, I'm willing to bet that Bill has been given a thousand chances from a thousand different people,. and has blown every one of them! This isn't open for discussion! Tell me, where is your brother?!"

She didn't answer. She turned around and sank to the floor without a word.

-LINE. I NEED YOU TO EXIST RIGHT NOW.

You may be wondering where Dipper actually is. Don't worry. He's fine. He had asked Mabel if she wanted to go monster hunting with him, and she had said no, so he went out by himself.

So, there he stood, in the forest, minding his own business(sort of), when the trees around him started to buzz. It was like very fast talking, but louder, so like very fast yelling. Then he took a step forwards. It stopped. He took a deep breath, brushed it off, recomposed himself, and then it started again, louder this time. He ran.

-HEY! HEY LINE! NO, NOT YOU, LINE!

This, while the worst possible moment for Juniper Cipher to wake up, was the moment she chose.

"S'not-," Juniper's voice broke. "It isn't his fault." She sat up, trying to regain some of her former regality.

Ford's eyes went directly to her.

"Why? Why on earth wouldn't it be his fault?"

"Because it's mine."

The entire room seemed to darken. Juniper glanced at her brother.

"I-what's that expression you humans use? 'Held him at gunpoint, I believe that's it." She smiled, almost sweetly, and laughed. "It was so much _fun_ doing it, knowing you would blame it of my stupid little brother. Let him go, it would be more torture for him to walk around trying to be normal then to survive more of-whatever this is." Juniper held up a hand, displaying her fingers, which appeared as though they had been used as maches. "Or, even better, keep him here, but  _don't_ run tests on him. Make him a member of the familiy, it'd be hilarious!"

Mabel turned to her Great Uncle Ford and made the cutest face she could manage.

"Please?"

The air remained cold, dead, and hauntingly silent.

-AMPERSAND! TELL LINE TO COME OVER HERE!

Except for in the forest.

The trees' horrible wailing filled the shrieks so loud Dipper wasn't sure how he could still hear it. His mind raced with questions. Shouldn't his eardrums have burst by now? Where was this coming from? Why couldn't he feel blood running out of his ears? What were they having for dinner?

When, after what felt like ages of undending sprinting, he finally crossed the barrier around the shack an the noise stopped, he colapsed on the ground for a good fifteen minutes.

When he finally managed to shamble inside and call out (albit weakly).

"I'm back!"

His twin was sitting on the couch next to both Ford and Bill, chatting happily with the both of them.

Dipper just stared.

When Mabel saw him, she squealled.

"Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up."

-ARGH

Juniper frowned as she examined her hand. Even when she had power, she had been highly flamable. The difference now was that she couldn't put herself out. Now her fingers weren't expendable, and they were more badly burnt then they had ever been in her seventeen millenia of life. Life as a multidimensional being, that was. With one exception. Juniper shuddered She hated being mortal. It broight back so many horrible memories...No. Best not to dwell on past bad events when even worse ones were to come.

She hoped Olyxian was safe, if he wasn't already dead.

-LINE! I SWEAR, YOU HAVE CROSSED THE LINE!

Bill Cipher wasn't safe. They were all around him, surrounding him, he couldn't breathe without inhaling them.

Oh, how he hated glitter.

"Shooting St-," he coughed. "-Star, what are you doing?!"

"Bedazzling you!" Mabel said, happier than she had been since Weirdmegeddon.

"Yeah, why?"

"Becau-," Apparently he wasn't the only one absorbing the tiny flecks of shiny plastic. "Because it's fun, silly!"

"Riiight. Fun."

"Yep."

"I feel like this is more glitter then should ever be on a human being through the entirety of their lives."

"Oh, definitely. Now, come with me, and we shall show the world true beauty!"

"True beauty?"

"Well, yeah. Who doesn't like hand turkeys?"

She she pulled him off the couch and dragged him into the kitchen.

Ford, ever the pessimist, followed, barely deterred by Bill's less-then-threatening nature.

Dipper was left in the tv room, still exhausted and unsure of what was actually going on. Mabel's chaotic and rambling explainations did him no good.

He pushed himself up tiredly and stretched. Something was wrong here, he was certain of it.

-LINE! I'M ONLY HALFWAY THROUGH THE CHAPTER! YOU CAN'T LEAVE YET!

Juinper hummed. She no longer remembered the name of the song, but something about it had always calmed her internal panic.

She heard a rumble. Not any rumble either, the rumble she had grown accustomed to this past week.

The elevator.

She hadn't expected any visitors so soon after she told them she had been the cause of her brother's actions.

She continued humming, louder now, and stood defiantly, though her lehs could barely hold her.

The elevator door opened. And she held her breath.

_Please, let it just be questions. Axolotl knows I can't take any more of this torture._

It was Dipper. He truly looked Mabel's twin, what with his curly chestnut hair, upturned nose, and chocolate eyes. But he was slimmer. Juniper's mother would have described his build as being elegant.

She let herself slide down to the floor.

"What do you wish to know, young one?"

"How do you know I want to ask anything?"

His voice was shaky.

"You are the knowlage seeker, are you not?"

"Knowlage- nevermind. Who are you, really?"

"I am Juniper, for the tree. I am, or, was a being of wood, of dreams, of hopes, of everything in between. A being of doorways, of night, of order. Or so I've been told. I could very well have been lied to."

He glared at her suspiciously.

"Why are you here?"

"This is my punishment for raising my dead brother. The universe does not take kindly to the reversal of natural processes."

"Why resurrect Bill?"

Here. Here was where she had to lie.

"What good puppeteer doesn' t fix their favorite puppet?"

She felt like a monster.


	6. The Most Ominous of All the Sea Otters

Bill smiled and handed Mabel the piece of burgandy paper he had oh-so-carefully traced his hand onto. He smiled because during this short time of tracing, he had discovered he was left handed. That was odd. He knew it. He loved it.

Not in a weird way, though.

Ford, on the other hand, frowned. Dispite his left-handedness, Bill seemed to him all too normal. As though he was faking it. So, as Mabel and Bill were coloring their hand turkey fingers various colors (or yellow, in Bill's case), he slammed his fist down on the table and said:

"I won't have it!"

The turkey-makers jumped.

"Won't have what?" Questioned Mabel.

"Me." Bill answered simply.  _"He_ doesn't like me. I don't have a clue why not. I'm a wonderful person!"

Mabel winced.

"Well, I wouldn't say  _wonderful._ You're more-,"

"He's completely evil, that's what he is!" Ford cut in. "And dark and omine-ominu-,"

There was a snort from Bill.

"Really? This is the first time you've tried to say ominous in  _thirty years?_ "

"What did you do?"

"It's not serious. You just can't say ominous."

"So not serious at all. Right." Ford snaped sarcasticly.

"Hold on. Say 'burden'."

The reponse was "Sea otter."

I do believe that is the first time a dream deamon has ever fallen out of a chair laughing.

-LINE! GO MAKE SURE THE CIPHER BOY SUFFERS NO PERMANENT DAMAGE FROM INTENSE GIGGLING WHILST I NARRATE THE NEXT PART OF THIS CHAPTER.

_He's clever, he can find a way out of there himself._

"Really? Clever isn't the word I would use."

_But he is clever. Astoundingly so. It's why I chose him. He just doesn't use it._

"He doesn't trust you. He belives you wish his downfall."

_He belives many things. He knows even more. I only wish the downfall of the darkness inside of him._

"This could be the fate of our entire world. Do you really want to put that on the ahoulders of a boy who never really grew past fifteen?"

_Even if he had not grown past fifteen, witch he has, I would still trust his judgement._

"Fine then. How are we to get the message to him that he has such a choice?"

_We aren't. Goodnight and Goodbye, my squire._

Malkinai turned and walked away, hoping despritely the Axolotl wasn't really going to have Bill make a choice that had anything to do with possible endangerment of the lives of others. He'd seen Olyxian make one of those. It hadn't ended well.

-OH MY GOSH! LINE! WE'RE IN THE CENTER OF THE PAGE!

WHAT HAPPENED?

Olyxian Diverend slept soundly most nights.

This was not most nights.

Olyxian, or, as his friends called him, Oly, rolled in bed restlessly, locked in the clutches of a nightmare that had him trying to claw his way up a mudslide. At the top, his classmates shouted at him, telling him that if he would just 'try a little harder' he could make it to the top. Although he yelled back at them he was 'trying his hardest, so if you _Aramarnin_ would shut up and let him concentrate' he could totally make it, but nobody listened.

Oly rolled off his bed and woke with a start as he hit the cold, hard floor.

_"Whoever invented nightmares is the worst."_

What time was it? It was still dark out, but it was so early in the year that didn't really mean anything.

Someone opened his door and turned on the light, revealing the clock on the wall. Hearn... still fairly early then.

"I heard a thump. You okay?" Asked his older sister Crisanthia, who was the someone who opened the door.

"Yeah." Oly replied tiredly. "Just fell out of bed. Now I'm getting back in and going to sleep."

"Oh no you aren't. How much have you studied for your history test today?"

"None."

"I'm going to have to fix that, arent I? Follow me, little bro."

They stayed up for what felt like forever. Crisanthia was hash and calculating.

Olyxian aced that test.

* * *

 

Oly smiled. Malkinai was right. Fire magic was worth it.  _Very_ worth it. The fire licked his palms, but it didn't burn him. Instead, it changed color. One moment it was dark green the next sky blue, switching so quickly Oly could barely recognize a color before it was gone. He loved it. He could do magic.  _Magic._ Only the  _Coliniasian_ were allowed to do magic. They had even gone so far as to saying that the  _Lironi couldn't_  do magic. Those  _Aramarnin._ He'd show them.

He'd show them.

\- NOOOOOO! LINE! YOU'VE BROKEN! WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITHOUT YOU!? LI-I-I-I-INE!

Crisanthia frowned. Something was off with Oly. She felt it. It was like the time he had lied to their parents about his report card, or when Tesimika had been picking on him in school. This, though...this was bigger. He was spending time alone voluntarily, which was something she had never seen him do before (just thinking about Oly in solitude seemed wrong). Then, when he thought nobody was listening, he'd talk to himself. He'd ask himself a question, there'd be a pause, and then he'd answer the question. Sure, sometimes the answer was a 'I don't know' or a 'I'll find out later', but that was  _still_ weird.

She sighed. Maybe she was wrong, maybe there wasn't anything Oly was hiding, maybe he was just growing up. This was talking away valuable time from her schoolwork. Crisanthia dug her claws into her desk. She'd figure it out later. Right now she had to write a paper.

-GUYS, LINE'S GONE AND I MISS HIM.

T84. What a stupid name for a dimention.

Still, if the Axolotl said they were here, they were here.

'Here' was a planet inhabited by boring humanoid reptiles who never did anything. They never even said they were going to do anything. These creatures were dull by nature. They did what the higher authority told them to do. Nothing more, nothing less.

This had got to be the worst mission to get sent on ever.

The inahbitents of T84 knew there were dimentions other than their own, and as such, paid no mind to the human woman walking down the street except to say a few hellos, good mornings, and how do you dos if she happened to run into one of them.

This was a fool's errand, but she couldn't give up.

-LINE! COME BACK! NOW!

Juniper watched him thoughtfully. After all, she and him were a lot alike if you thought about it enough. She had no doubt that was why he had chosen him.

That, or he had simply needed someone genuinely intelligent. He was like that.

Okay. She might have had some doubt in her mind, but not much. Not much.

-GET WELL SOON?

Cipher. It was fitting. She'd have no choice but to adhere if he called himself Cipher. Besides, it was just a joke.

He winced.

Of course it was just a joke. Everything was with him, wasn't it?

That was him.

Just one. Big. JOKE.

-PLEASE?

It was cold. Really cold. Olyxian shivered. Should he really be doing this?

 _"Moricino,"_  he whispered, and a fire sparked to life in his hands. He smirked. Of course he should. If he didn't, who would? Not his sister, certainly. She was too good. She'd refused to come with him.

He continued through the snow.

 

 

 


	7. Timely

This was-This was-suspicious? No. The truth was, Stanford Pines wasn't completely certain how to describr the situation he was in right now.

He had been doing some work while Bill watched him, and suddenly Bill had told him he had calculated some square footage incorrectly, promptly correcting it. It was 11:36 P.M., so naturally both twins were in bed, and couldn't save him.

So he just watched as Bill, who seemed completely oblivious to how awkward this was, went down the page like a teacher grading homework, marking and fixing mistakes as he saw them. After what was only a few minutes but seemed an eternity to Ford, Bill ran out of math to analyze, and looked up.

"So?"

"So what?"

"Why'd you stop?"

There was a long pause.

"Because you're being weird. Shoo."

Bill pouted a moment, then got up and walked away, leaving Ford to himself.

Mostly.

Juniper watched him, her eyes full of hurt and pain and fear, but aĺso curiousity. She didn't know him, didn't get him or why he did this. She had figured Bill had done something not-quite-right to Ford, but she was unsure of what. She knew he was the Hand. She had met one of them once, and she knew from reading that they were stubborn, intelligent, and oftentimes had some connection to the Mackerel, or had met the Centerpeice before their chance to use the zodiac.

She frowned. Stubbon, inteligent people were the hardest to manipulate. She would not be getting out of her cage easily.

Then Ford turned to her.

She tensed.

"Who are you, really?" He questioned.

She thought of replying like her brother always did-he would have said 'Who are any of us, really?'' Because he was Bill and he was snarky like that when he thought he was in control-but surveying the burns that had slowly crept from her fingers down to her wrists, decided against it.

"I told you who I was."

"Bill disgrees. He says that he was responsible for all the damage he'd done, and that you would never come up with it in a million years."

" _Bill_ doesn't know what he's talking about."

"If he knows you did it, Then why lie?"

"You should be asking me the same thing."

And that, my friends, is how you shut up a Stanford Pines.

He glared at her, then went back to his math.

A machine in the other side of the room beeped.

He looked up.

"Did you hear that?" He asked her.

She nodded.

He stood.

Then time stopped.

Then time restarted.

Later.

Much later.

* * *

 

_"Deck the halls with boughs of holly_

_Fa LaLaLaLa La La La_

_Tis the season to be jolly_

_Fa LaLaLaLa La La La_

_Don we now our gay apparel_

_FaLaLa FaLaLa Fa La La_

_"I really hate Christmas carols. BlahBlahBlahBlahBlah, Blah Blah Blah Blah_." Juniper finshed the song abruptly, placing the box of decorations she had been asked to retrieve from the basement on the table.  
"Aww, come on! Don't be a Scrooge slash Grinch! The holidays are the best!" Mabel pleaded, crossinh her arms over her chest and making a pouty face. "Oh! Wait! Wait wait wait, stay here. I have to go get something." Then she ran out of the room.  
"Yeah!" Bill agreed. "You get to eat all the pepermints you want, and nobody judges you! NOBODY!"

"I don't think anyone would dare judge you anyway. At least not out loud." Dipper said.

"At least I don't have antlers growing out of my head. You look like a deer."

"I know!" Dipper screeched. "I just-don't know how to get rid of them! I've tried everything that I could think of! I-,"

He was cut off by an ugly Christmas sweater that looked like it had practically invented the term 'ugyly Christmas sweater' being pulled over his face.

"Ohhh no. You art not making me wear one if those." Juniper threw her hands up into the air and began to walk out of the room. Naturally, she was caught by Mabel (who was also wearing a sweater) and one of the fuzzy abomibations was shoved unceremoniously over her head.

-LINE! YOU'RE BACK! I'D HUG YOU, BUT I DON'T HAVE ARMS, SORT OF.

"Oh hey, look, the future. " Bill said, as though traveling ten years into the future were totally normal for him. (Then again, perhaps it was. )

Dipper scanned the newspaper. Unfortunately, there was nothing super useful other than the information that it was the year 2023.

It looked around Christmastime, with its colorful lights shining and blinking in the shops, the snow on the ground, and the...more colorful lights shining and blinking in the shops.

There were a lot of shiny blinky lights this year.

Then they saw Dipper.

He was taller than he was now, but still short, his skin was tinted green, and he had antlers.

Yes, antlers. They were gigantic, but luckily also mostly upwards and not sideways, so that he didn't run into people with them.

He looked like he was tring to walk through a crowd that had gathered in the middle of town for some unexpected Christmas party.

If you have ever tried to walk through a crowd with giant antlers on your head unnoticed, you know that it is incredibly difficult.

If you have not ever tried to walk through a crowd with giant antlers on your head unnoticed, let me tell you...it is incredibly difficult.

As Dipper walked, he got more and more attention, until suddenly nobody cared about the impromptu party. All eyes were on Mason Geoffrey Pines.

Mabel knew her brother hated to be the center of attention. He had always hated to be the center of attention. Older Dipper was so cute in a non-romantic way, too!

This led her to one conclusion. Dipper needed saving. She was just the girl to do it, too.

She snuck up onto the stage located in the center of town, found a microphone, and said simply "HEY! LEAVE MY BROTHER ALONE!"

Nobody was looking at Dipper anymore. Mabel was their new point of intrest.

"NOW LORD DIPPINGSAUCE! RUN! RUN AWAY! FAR, FAR AWAY TO A LAND WHERE THERE ARE KITTENS AND PUPPIES AND RAINBOWS!"

And so Dipper ran.

-LINE IS ALSO JUST AS ANNOYING AS I REMEMBER.

Panting, the Pine Tree leaned against a building, tring to catch his breath.

Why? Why did the very world hate him?

As soon as he had seen a Mabel who was decidedly not twenty-four, the Christmas lights he'd been sent to the store for no longer mattered.

This Dipper had no recollection of time travel, and wondered if Mabel did. Maybe she did. Maybe she didn't. He had no way of knowing except asking.

Maybe Mabel was Mabel from another dimention. Axolol knew how many enemies they had made over the years.

So, when he walked into the Mystery Shack (though it was no longer called the Mystery Shack, the Mystery Shack closed down in 2021, just two years ago) he was not happy to find that nobody else really cared.

Well, they couldn't find Juniper. She was probably in her room though, skulking about how awful Christmas was, even though nobody else thought she was being completely unreasonable.

So the three of the remaining Dimention Adventurers set off to find one thirteen-year-old Mabel.

They didn't have to look far.

\- Astrisk cannot speak to you right now, as she is currently busy doing the tango. My apologies.

It isn't every day you get to sit across from your past self, drinking hot chocolate and wishing you hadn't ever come to the future in the first place, because you're sure you're about to make some horrible mistake that messes up the entire universe.

Nonetheless, that's what Mabel Pines was doing. Her brother had been sitting next to her, but then grew had started hyperventilating and had to leave.

"Well, darn it." Said Future Mabel (Fabel) simply.

"Why Darn it?" Questioned Past Mabel (Pabel).

"I was HOPING that I could have an uneventful Christmas this year."

"Oh. Sorry."

"Meh. Uneventful Christmases are always the most boring ones anyways."

Fabel found her mind drifting to the other room, where Bill and Juniper were questioning their past and probably unwittingly playing Good Cop, Bad Cop. She could almost hear Bill's snarkiness through the door.

Mabel liked being the Bad Cop, but she'd have needed a Good Cop, so she had chosen to start the interrogation this way-a confession of her feelings.

"So, um...I don't feel like doing this right now, so if we go out there and say you're good, could you not stab me in the back?"

"Sure."

"Great."

"Yeah."

There was an awkward pause before Fabel grabbed Pabel's arm and dragged her out the door.

-She's doing the tango with Ampersand, too.

"... and, therefore, getting you back to your own time by this evening." Finished Future Dipper.

Past Dipper nodded. He hadn't understood half of what his future self had just said, but he was prepared to act like he had completely comprehended every word.

"You didn't actually understand half of what I just said, did you?" Future Dipper asked.

Well, by the way he worded it, it should have been a question, but it sounded a lot more like a statement.

"Whaaaat...?" protested past Dipper. "I, um,  _totally_ knew what you were talking about that whole time! Ha, ha ha, ha ha ha."

"Jeez. The others said I was bad at acting, but I didn't realize I was  _that_ bad."

"Hey!"

"Avoiding this conversation. So, um, ask me anything! You won't remember any of this this evening, so it'll be fine."

"I...well...,"

"I said anything. I'm  _you,_ you know. I know? I don't know."

"Antlers." Past Dipper squeaked.

"Wha-oh. Um, so...um...I may have been trying to...um, get into a meeting of the multidimensional council, and then...um...they found me out."

"And gave you antlers?"

"No...the antlers were a last resort. I was trying to do the spell, then Bill, who was fed up with my...um...incompetence at magic, did it. Only Bill plus magic equals crazy sticky spells. Bill also doesn't remember it, which just makes it worse."

Then they sat next to each other silently.

-Like, hello, who is your best friend here?

As it turned out, Bill Cipher was a food vacuum when he was nervous. Fact.

Junper Cipher was sassy when she was nervous.

Together, they were rarely nervous.

Now was one of those rare moments.

"Listen, I don't  _care_ about your problems, so if you'd kindly show us to the exit, that'd be great." Juniper said, every word as sharp as a knife. "Back me up here, Bill!")

Bill just ate another entire box of Chipackerz and stared off into space.

"Bill!"

"They taste just like chips." Bill muttered.

Future Bill was curled up on the floor, laughing so hard he was incapable of breathing, while Future Juniper was tring to supress her giggles.

"IT'S NOT FUNNY!" Shrieked Past Juniper.

"No...," said Future Bill. "It's hilarious!"

This led to more uncontrollable laughter until Future Dipper walked into the room, with Past Dipper following him like a shadow.

"What's going on in here?" Asked Past Dipper.

"CHIPACKERZ!" Was all Future Juniper managed to scream before going back to her giggle fit.

"I found a way to get them back to their own time." Shouted Future Dipper.

The laughter died down, and everyone looked at Future Dipper.

"This evening, we just have to gather them in the basement and push the button on a thing." (This is obviously a simplified version of what Future Dipper actually said.)

"Okay." Was the response.

Chicken. Bill would like you to know they had chicken that night.

And they talked. They talked about a million things, because Dipper had made it so that his machine would erase the memories of the future.

"This furure."Bill had corrected. "This doesn't have to be Our future. Our future depends entirely on this choices we make."

-I'M BACK! I WAS BUSY TRYING TO HIDE FROM LINE.

That night, Juniper sat in her cage, pondering the future.

She wasn't sure why. There was something about it that conforted her.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You get an early chapter, because I'm out of internet next week. Hurray.


	8. Chapter 8

"How about we make a deal?" Juniper watched Ford closely while he tinkered with one of his machines. It was smoking, and since it wasn't a smoke machine, Juniper guessed that was probably a bad thing.

Ford ignored her and mumbled something about time travel.

"I bet I could fix that." She said, smiling as much as she could while her feet still burned too much from her latest round of experimentation for her to stand.

"I bet you could." Ford said simply.

Ugh. She had to offer him something he couldn't get himself. She guessed that was what Bill had done. That, or he had wormed his way into Ford's head, figured out what he wanted, and then offered him that, but ten times better. Bill was a people person, he had always been. Juniper could still remember the times when they'd just been brother and sister, and they would walk down the street, and Bill would guess what the people they passed were like.

He'd been right almost every time. Though she supposed it must have been easier in their flat world, the world Bill had always called boring and predictable.

Naturally, Juniper continued to pester Ford. She had to figure out what he wanted. Then the only problem would be actually getting it to him. She was no longer the puppet she had been, worthless, but invaluable at the same time, because she had been granted with more power then she could contain, and too foolish to know that her supposed friends were only threre to boss her around with their 'messages from the Axolotl'. She had heard only one real message from the Axolotl, and once she had, it was the only thing she thought of in her spare time. Apperently, it detailed her brother.

_"Sixty degrees that come in threes_

_Watches from within birch trees._

_Saw his own dimention burn._

_Misses home and can't return._

_Says he's happy._

_He's a liar._

_Blame the arson for the fire._

There was more, but at that point, Juniper's brain had just kind of shut off. SAW his own dimention burn? Not Set his own dimention on fire and laughed - JUST LAUGHED- as everything they had ever known was completely consumed by flames? She could almost still feel the burning. She could almost still hear the screams. She could definitely still see her brother's horrible grinning face as fire surrounded him. Anger welled up inside her. The little  _Aramarnin._ Why should she care if he wasn't happy? WHY THE  _TARIKOUS_ should she care if he were DEAD? He had never given a  _Halia_  for what she thought!

-HEY! LINE! HEY! HEY LINE! HEY!

 _"I wish Juniper were here right now."_ Bill thought as he and Mabel sat on the female Pines twin's bed, talking. Dipper glared at him from across the room. He'd refused to talk to Bill, which Mabel said was ridiculous, as even Great Uncle Ford had started talking to Bill-though not in the friendliest manner. He'd called Bill a few names either of the two of them would have been grounded a month for if repeated.

"C'mon, Pine Tree, can't you even sign langage me?" Bill called over.

Mabel shook her head. "Dipper doesn't know sign language."

 _"Yes I do.,"_ Dipper signed. " _I read a book."_

"YAY!" Bill shrieked. "COMMUNICATION!"

Mabel snorted.

"It's always a book with you, isn't it?"

Dipper nodded.

"Always,"

"COMMUNICATION!" Bill screamed again.

Stan walked in.

"Hey! You! Demon kid! Shut up, would ya? It is bedtime for Stan. You dorks too."

He nodded. A quick glance out the widow confirmed it. He could see quite a few stars in the sky. Bill stood. He was locked in the 'spare' room every nigh to sleep. It was technically Ford's bedroom, but Ford never used it. He was too used to sleeping on on the ground. Bill felt a pang of guilt. Then he reminded himself that this was Ford, and not the geeky Ford who was in his late thiries and obsessed with finding his 'Grand Unified Theory of Weirdness'. This was the Ford who set his face on fire because it was faster than shaving, the Ford who would not belive anything Bill said, but instead doubted it, the Ford who had traded clothes with a twin to trick him, and to kill him. This was the Ford who knew, and would do anything to protect his family.

Bill had a sudden flashback to when he had been about to kill Mabel. Mabel, who he had always just kind of ignored, someone he had deemed unimportant until she had exactly what he wanted. She had fighting spirt, sure, but he had always considered her the way he'd considered Stan-a stupider, more gulible version of her twin.

Mabel, who he now knew was sweet and kind and had given him a second chance when nobody else believed.

He had almost killed her. He had almost KILLED her. She would have been dead, gone, never to see the light of day again.

Had the other people he'd killed been like Mabel? He hadn't even considered it. He'd killed them just to kill something, to watch the looks on the faces of their families and friends. The shock. The horror. The anger.

It all hit him like a brick wall.

He couldn't be tusted.

He was a murderer.

He didn't deserve to live.

He was a monster.

He thought all this as he sobbed into his pillow, not wanting to wake anyone.

Tomorrow, he thought.

_"I can be better."_

* * *

 

 

 


	9. Upside-Down Town

Being a Dream Demon, it was very rare that Bill Cipher was held against his will.

It was even rarer he was held upside-down against his will.

It wasn't even that bad being hung upside down.

But it was the middle of the night, and it was cold.

Now, you may be thinking "what the hot cheese is going on here?".

Bill was too.

Except he didn't think 'hot cheese'.

-OKAY LINE, BREAK'S OVER. BACK TO WORK.

The middle of the woods at night was one of the last places Juniper Cipher would have expected to find herself.

She loved the woods, of course.

She had been trapped in a cage though.

And she was hanging upside down.

What was up with that?

-C'MON! WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?

The first thing Mabel Pines noticed was the face full of sweater.

It had slid down her body-luckily she was wearing a tank top underneath- and gotten in her mouth. And nose. And eyes.

Then she noticed two more things.

1\. She was hanging upside down.

2\. She was in the woods.

As she was fairly certain she hadn't gone to sleep like this, she knew she'd been moved.

But by who?

-MOOOOOOVE!

Dipper Pines, monster hunter extraordinaire, was not happy.

Not.

One.

Bit.

All the blood that was supposed to be evenly distributed throughout his body was in his head.

Having all the blood that's supposed to be evenly distributed throughout your body in your head is unpleasant.

Though that's probably not a suprise.

-NO, I DO NOT SOUND LIKE A COW WHEN I SAY THAT!

Olyxian Diverend had failed alnost every class he had in school, except for government. He'd gotten a good solid B in that class, and Physical Education, where he'd gotten a C.

It wasn't

his fault, of was the fault of the People On Top (as his mother called them) for lying to everyone.

Or, at least, that's what he told himself. He couldn't shake the idea that maybe he shouldn't do this. If he failed, he'd become a laughingstock. Just another crazy to go down with the other two they learned about in school.

He wished he could've met those crazys. They seemed fun, like a light in his dim, flat world.

He had to do this.

Hey, if he failed, something would accept him, even if it was only the history books.

-THE COW ONLY SAYS MOO! NO VE!

It took about twenty minutes and her emergency sweater-yarn-cutting scissors, but Mabel finally managed to cut the rope tied around her ankles.

She fell to the ground in a heap and muttered a quiet 'Owwww'.

Then she stood up, fixed her sweater, and wondered where the hot Belgian waffles she was.

She hoped it wasn't one of Bill's tricks, for two reasons.

1\. She thought he was getting better! That he was going to stop being an evil jerkface!

2\. She knew that Bill was probably very good with traps and plans, and had probably left her emergency sweater-yarn-cutting scissors with her on purpose, expecting her to get down and do whatever he had planned. Or maybe she was right about to walk into a trap and get herself killed. Or maybe Bill had accidentally left her her emergency sweater-yarn-cutting scissors, and expected her to hang upside-down until her head exploded, in which case- DUDE! Why would you do that!?

She was getting off track here. Where was she? She wondered if anyone was coming to get her, then remembered that it was the middle of the night and all sensible people would be asleep right now.

So she chose a direction and started walking.

Then, after around half an hour had passed, she heard a crash like something falling. She began to run in the other direction, making as little noise as possible, before she heard a shout come from the same placw the crash had.

A shout that was most definitely her brother's. So she did a 360 and ran back the other direction to Dipper.

* * *

 

Dipper, who it appeared had been hung higher up in his tree, had hit the ground hard. Luckily, however, he'd landed not on his head, like Mabel, but his back.

It still hurt, like, a lot, and had knocked the wind out of him, but he hadn't broken his neck. That was good. Not breaking your neck is  _usually_ good.

I know, you're shocked.

Dipper had just begun breathing normally again when he saw Mabel. Her sweater was torn, her hair was a tangled mess from getting caught on branches, and she was holding- were those her emergency sweater-yarn-cutting scissors? Nevertheless, his sister looked _awesome._ Like a character from Harry Potter right after the Battle of Hogwarts.

"Dipper!" She sheriked vehemently.

"Mabel!" Dipper called, trying to stand and failing. "Everything hurts."

"Lord Dippingsauce! What happened?"

"I fell down. I was hanging upside down from that tree." He pointed.

"I noticed. How did you get down? It looks like you coaxed a group of squirrels to chew through the rope for you."

"What? That's ridiculous. My pockets were fastened, so nothing fell out, and I used my library card to cut through the strings one by one."

"Oh, okay."

-LINE, KEEP DOING YOUR JOB.

The Interdimentional Loops. It was a practically impossible knot to untie if you didn't know how it worked.

Bill Cipher knew how it worked. He'd been taught a long time ago, but it was also so simple when you knew how it worked. He imagined Juniper would know how to untie it-if Juniper was hanging upside down somewhere too. And he supposed that maybe Stanford would know it, though Bill couldn't figure out who would have taught him. Hallia, he could barely remember anyone who could have taught him. So perhaps he didn't know it. Or maybe, during one of his daring escapes, he had achieved the nearly impossible and figured it out.

He was rambling to himself. It was a useful thing to be able to do in the mindscape, where he just had to sit and think for hours on end, but not here. While he was upside down untying a The Interdimentional Loops.

Bill was glad it was a The Interdimentional Loops, because, well, for one, he knew how to untie it, and for two, it ment that his kiddnapper was sloppy. Nobody who knew who he was would have put him in a The Interdimentional Loops. The idea of it was ridiculous.

Also, he had just promised himself that he would be a good- wait, scratch that. Good is a strong word- moderately okay person! Decent Person? Not evil person. Yeah. There it was.

Ahem.

Also, he had just promised himself that he would be a not evil person!

He couldn't be not evil in the middle of the forest! He-oh, wait, he could be not evil in the middle of the forest.

He decided he would do that as he fell to the ground. He had grabbed a branch right before he fell, and landed on his feet.

He broke his ankle. He nearly screamed before he bit his tongue and forced himself to take deep breaths.

Stupid fragile human body. Stupid. Stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid.

So he sat there, unable to walk, and decided that pain, physical pain at least, was not hilarious.

 

 

 


	10. Chapter 10

_In memory of Olyxian Diverend._

_The Council wishes to thank all those who donated their time and money to the creation of this monument._

_Remember, Diverend was a liar and a theif who only wished the downfall of The Council._

_Everything he said he stood for was either blatantly false or morally wrong._

_Do not attempt to be like him._

_Good day._

Olyxian Diverend was not dead. Many thought he was. Many believed (or hoped) he was not. But that didn't actually play any role in the fact that Olyxian Diverend was still alive. He still had a few more days to live.

So he spent them in a cave. He hated himself for it, but he spent the last few days of his life hiding like a coward in a cave because he was afraid of what might happen to him if he didn't. So Olyxian died like a coward. He found his body a few days later and sighed.

"Fool." Olyxian spat. Then he turned on his heels and walked away.

Olyxian Diverend was dead. He couldn't possibly be alive. It was the middle of Winter. He had run out there wearing little more than his threadbare jacket and bright green heels. He was dead. Dead before he even died.

Crysanthia wept for him. No one else cared. Well, none but those who were foolish enough to rejoice at his death. Those people, oddly enough, died of unexplained causes within a week.

In everyone's mind, he remained a troublemaker. He had always to make a mess of any punishment he was given, to the point where he had to have instructions given to him with incredible detail so that he couldn't possibly find any loopholes. He still found loopholes.

-LINE! JEEZ, CAN YOU BELIVE HER? SHE WROTE NEARLY HALF THE CHAPTER WITHOUT US!

Click-click-click-click-click.

Bill grabbed a tree branch and pulled himself into a standing position.

Click-click-click-click-click.

"Who's there?" He called.

Click-click-click-click-click. The clicks were getting closer.

"Who's there?!" He called again. He cringed at the fear in his voice.

Click-click-click-click-click. Closer.

The branch he had been holding himself up with broke and he accidentally put weight on his broken ankle. He winced and held his breath.

Click-click-click-click-click. A little closer.

Click-click-click-click-click.

didn't seem to be getting closer anymore.

He couldn't hold his breath any longer and gasped.

Click-click-click-click-click. Much closer.

He figured whatever clicky thing was out there went by sound.

Click-click-click-click-click.

He threw a stick.

Click-click-click-

He'd hit the thing, hadn't he?

Clickclickclickclickclick. The clicks had gotten faster and much, much closer.

Maybe death wouldn't be all that bad.

Clickclickclickclickclick. It was almost here.

Then he saw it.

-OOOH! CLIFFHANGERY! LINE! COME HERE SO YOU CAN SEE HOW EVIL THIS CLIFFHANGER IS!

It took Juniper Cipher a little over an hour to figure out The Interdimensional Loops. She'd never seen it before. It was a knot dimension-traveling outlaws used for tying people up.

Fun.

She hadn't been very far off of the ground, and while she did bruise some, she was fine.

It took her twenty seconds after that to hear a clicking. Then there was a faint 'Who's there?' In the distance. Then, from that same direction, the clicking again.

She frowned. There was a second 'Who's there?'. It was loud enough this time that she could tell it was her brother. Then there was the clicking again.

Then there was a snap, and she ran in the direction of her brother the prey and his clicking predator.

* * *

Oh, so it was Hallianiam, or, as the humans-though Bill supposed he was human now too-called it, The Hide-Behind. How fun.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't the Cipher boy."

" _You_ brought me here?"  
"Well, obviously."

"Why? the last I had heard, you preferred not to deal with humans."  
"I wouldn't call you completely human, at least not quite yet."

Being the person Bill was (aka Bill), wasn't working, so he tried a different approach. He feigned arrogance. He threw in a bit of charming, a hint of proper, and one of his best smiles. It wasn't difficult for him, of course. Feigning arrogance had quickly become one of Bill's most useful traits after he'd become the Spirit of Chaos.

"Evidently. I shouldn't think you ever will."

"Oh, shut up Cipher. You and I both know that's a mask."  
"Really? and you would know that how?"

"I have a source."

"Let me guess: they want me dead, and are paying _you_ to kill me. They've said they'll give you anything you want just as long as it isn't completely unreasonable."

"I suppose there isn't any point in not telling you, as you're about to die, so _yes._ "

"News flash, Hallianiam. Most people who want me dead are either just as cutthroat as I am, and wouldn't keep a promise to pay a Rllic one single Hallia, or are sickeningly good and will arrest you for murder after you kill me. So get out of here Hallianiam, you worthless puppet master wannabe. Return me to the Pines' residence. Unless, of course, you _want_ to die a slow and painful death."

There was a flicker of anger in Hallianiam's eyes, before he grinned, showcasing his long, sharp teeth.

"You're powerless. You can't even stand up. By what means shall you kill me? What you never have understood, Cipher, is that you're predictable. You try not to be. Some days you'll just sit around drinking tea or playing chess just to through everyone off. Yet, even though you have always followed your instincts and never used your head when making a decision, what you are about to do is so blatantly obvious even a Rllic could predict it. You come from a predictable world, a predictable class, and a predictable family. YOU ARE PREDICTABLE. Just admit it already. Say it."

That hurt. That really hurt. If there was one thing Bill Cipher tried to avoid being, it was predictable. He _hated_ predictable.

"No. Never."

"Say it."

"I'm not predictable."

Then there was pain. His right arm flew up to his left. His left arm had three long, deep gashes in it, and he was bleeding heavily.

"Say it."

"I'm not," he gasped as he accidently drove a fingernail into one of his injuries. "I'm not predictable."

More pain. More gashes. Right arm this time.

_"Say it."_

He didn't say anything. He couldn't. His arms were in such incredible pain, and he didn't want more of that, but he also couldn't say he was predictable. He couldn't. For whatever reason, he tried anyway. Just once.

"I-I-I'm pr-pre-," he stopped there. In the trees, he saw them. Mystery Twins gen. 2, Mabel and Dipper. Bill smiled faintly. Mabel had-something sharp and metal and pointy, at least, and she appeared to be trying to get her brother to come over to her while he...walked away. Bill's smile disappeared. He supposed they had good reasons just to leave him.

"Go on."

"I'm pred-,"

Mabel was coming back, without Dipper. She tiptoed closer until she was hiding right behind the Hide-Behind.

"Say it."

Bill was starting to feel dizzy from blood loss. Still, with all the master of the world confidence he could muster, he stood, and he shouted.

"I'm not predictable, and I never will be, you old scared fool!"

Bill felt burning agony, like lava being poured onto his sides, then he heard Mabel scream and saw her stab Hallianiam in the back, before everything went black.


End file.
